Lennard Freeman has been bothered by a chronic injury to his right leg for most of the past two seasons

The N.C. State basketball team will be significantly deeper next season than it was in 2015-16, especially now that forward Abdul-Malik Abu had withdrawn his name from the NBA draft and returned to school.

Coach Mark Gottfried will have so many options, especially in the frontcourt, that he now has the luxury of bringing junior Lennard Freeman back slowly from his latest surgery.

Freeman underwent a procedure on Wednesday that removed a 16-inch steel rod from his chronically injured lower right leg and replaced with a thicker rod. Gottfried said that barring a “miraculous” recovery, the 6-foot-8 forward will likely redshirt.

“He just needs time,” Gottfried said of Freeman, who averaged 3.2 points and 5.0 rebounds per game despite battling a painful stress reaction to the injured leg. “He needs time to fully heal, fully get himself ready and go through an offseason where he can actually work out every day and go through all of our skill development drills.”

Freeman missed most of last summer’s offseason work while recovering from the surgery that inserted the original rod in his leg.

“He wants a period of time when he can really get in shape and really get healthy, so saying all that I can see where he would be a redshirt guy this year,” Gottfried said. “We’ll wait and see for sure, but that’s my anticipation.”

Freeman

Despite his lack of preparation, Freeman had to be rushed back to action for the start of last season because of a depleted roster that featured only eight scholarship players after guard Terry Henderson was injured in the opening game.

The Wolfpack is better equipped to handle Freeman’s absence next season thanks to Abu being back, the anticipated return of BeeJay Anya and the addition of highly regarded freshmen Omer Yurtseven and Darius Hicks.

Even with the added options, Gottfried said he’s not finished looking for more talent to add to his team’s roster.

“We went through a year this past year where we probably shorthanded to begin with, then we had injures on top of that,” Gottfried said. “That’s not a fun place to be in at all. Having done that, we’re in a position now with a mindset that we’re going to add as much depth as possible.”